Originally posted by cluckerspud
I thought it was "the love for money is the root of all evil"?!
meaning "the love for it is what is evil". Not the money.

Also, I see "evil" as a poisonous flower which can have a multiple
array of roots.

Peoples passion or love for anything could be construed with evil.

Stay focused. Do not think too much. Take a deep breath.

For the love of money is the root of all evil: which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with
many sorrows.

Now you can take that in context and read the whole chapter and get a picture of what is trying to be conveyed or you can take it at face value and
realize that the love of money is the root of all evil. It does not mention peoples passions or love for anything else. This is really cool for me.
There is a verse in the Bible that also says that His word will not return to Him void but will accomplish what He pleases and prosper in the thing
whereto He sent it. So be of good cheer. His word is performing its desired goal as you read.

Book of Isaiah 55:11 so shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I
please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it.

Money, like most things in this life, is balanced between good and evil. Some people lust for it (bankers) while other people use it for good
(philanthropists). I would be willing to bet that the majority of the people in the world could be categorized into the lust aspect. I gots to be
livin like Fiddy baby!

Money in and of itself is a tool, but a tool for materialism. People judge other people based on what and how much they have more than they judge
them purely on their character. Some people won't even talk to you if you make under 100,000 a year. They are somehow "different" and "better"
than you because they have more paper than you do.

Now while I won't say that money is the ROOT of all evil, I will say that money is a tool and a facilitator for evil.

actually, the bible states, "For the love of money is the root of all evil." I Timonthy 6:10. Money is nothing more than a tool, a medium of
exchange. It is only when we begin to value the tool itself, over what the tool is to be used for that it becomes evil.
That is why Jesus said it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of needle, than it is for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. Many
people who have money, who are rich, are selfish, ignore the poor and downtrodden, because they love money.
There others who are rich, but not only do they preach charity, they put their money where their mouths are. Bill Gates is one example, Angelia Jolie
is another quite beautiful example. And like it or not, Bill O'Reilly is another.
And then there are those who are wealthy and want to redistribute the wealth through social enginering, while keeping their own wealth, are those I
believe Jesus was speaking of.
Ted Kennedy comes to mind. As does John Kerry.
I guess it's all a matter of perspective.
edit for spelling and I probably still missed a few.

"So you think that money is the root of all evil?" said Francisco d'Anconia. "Have you ever asked what is the root of money? Money is a tool
of exchange, which can't exist unless there are goods produced and men able to produce them. Money is the material shape of the principle that men
who wish to deal with one another must deal by trade and give value for value. Money is not the tool of the moochers, who claim your product by tears,
or of the looters, who take it from you by force. Money is made possible only by the men who produce. Is this what you consider evil?

"When you accept money in payment for your effort, you do so only on the conviction that you will exchange it for the product of the effort of
others. It is not the moochers or the looters who give value to money. Not an ocean of tears not all the guns in the world can transform those pieces
of paper in your wallet into the bread you will need to survive tomorrow. Those pieces of paper, which should have been gold, are a token of honor.
Your claim upon the energy of the men who produce. Your wallet is your statement of hope that somewhere in the world around you there are men who will
not default on that moral principle which is the root of money, is this what you consider evil?

"Have you ever looked for the root of production? Take a look at an electric generator and dare tell yourself that it was created by the muscular
effort of unthinking brutes. Try to grow a seed of wheat without the knowledge left to you by men who had to discover it for the first time. Try to
obtain your food by means of nothing but physical motions and you'll learn that man's mind is the root of all the goods produced and of all the
wealth that has ever existed on earth.

"But you say that money is made by the strong at the expense of the weak? What strength do you mean? It is not the strength of guns or muscles.
Wealth is the product of man's capacity to think. Then is money made by the man who invents a motor at the expense of those who did not invent it? Is
money made by the intelligent at the expense of the fools? By the able at the expense of the incompetent? By the ambitious at the expense of the lazy?
Money is made before it can be looted or mooched, made by the effort of every honest man, each to the extent of his ability. An honest man is one who
knows that he can't consume more than he has produced.

"To trade by means of money is the code of the men of good will. Money rests on the Axiom that every man is the owner of his mind and his effort.
Money allows no power to prescribe the value of your effort except the voluntary choice of the man who is willing to trade you his effort in return.
Money permits you to obtain for your goods and your labor that which they are worth to the men who buy them, but no more. Money permits no deals
except those to mutual benefit by the unforced judgment of the traders. Money demands of you the recognition that men must work for their own benefit,
not for their own injury, for their gain, not their loss. The recognition that they are not beasts of burden, born to carry the weight of your misery,
that you must offer them values, not wounds. That the common bond among men is not the exchange of suffering, but the exchange of goods. Money demands
that you sell, not your weakness to men's stupidity, but your talent to their reason; it demands that you buy, not the shoddiest they offer, but the
best that your money can find. And when men live by trade, with reason, not force, as their final arbiter, it is the best product that wins, the best
performance, the man of best judgment and highest ability, and the degree of a man's productiveness is the degree of his reward. This is the code of
existence whose tool and symbol is money. Is this what you consider evil?

snip

Or did you say it's the love of money that's the root of all evil? To love a thing is to know and love its nature. To love money is to know and love
the fact that money is the creation of the best power within you, and your passkey to trade your effort for the effort of the best among men. It's
the person who would sell his soul for a nickel, who is loudest in proclaiming his hatred of money, and he has good reason to hate it. The lovers of
money are willing to work for it. They know they are able to deserve it.

"Let me give you a tip on a clue to men's characters: the man who damns money has obtained it dishonorably; the man who respects it has earned it.

"Run for your life from any man who tells you that money is evil. That sentence is the leper's bell of an approaching looter. So long as men live
together on earth and need means to deal with one another their only substitute, if they abandon money, is the muzzle of a gun.

"But money demands of you the highest virtues, if you wish to make it or to keep it. Men who have no courage, pride or self-esteem, men who have no
moral sense of their right to their money and are not willing to defend it as they defend their life, men who apologize for being rich will not remain
rich for long. They are the natural bait for the swarms of looters that stay under rocks for centuries, but come crawling out at the first smell of a
man who begs to be forgiven for the guilt of owning wealth. They will hasten to relieve him of the guilt and of his life, as he deserves.

"Then you will see the rise of the men of the double standard, the men who live by force, yet count on those who live by trade to create the value of
their looted money, the men who are the hitchhikers of virtue. In a moral society, these are the criminals, and the statutes are written to protect
you against them. But when a society establishes criminals-by-right and looters-by-law, men who use force to seize the wealth of disarmed victims,
then money becomes its creators' avenger. Such looters believe it safe to rob defenseless men, once they've passed a law to disarm them. But their
loot becomes the magnet for other looters, who get it from them as they got it. Then the race goes, not to the ablest at production, but to those most
ruthless at brutality. When force is the standard, the murderer wins over the pickpocket. And then that society vanishes, in a spread of ruins and
slaughter.

Yes, Ayn Rand, the dear old blowhole. I find she huffs and puffs a bit too much for me to take her entirely seriously, but all that hot air does tend
to blow away the cobwebs.

This is a classic debater's topic, so one tends to want to begin by defining terms: better still, to agree upon them. But this is not so easy. The
trouble with these small, punchy Biblical words is that they have such a wealth of meaning: so many meanings, indeed, that no two people seem to agree
exactly about what they do mean.

'Evil' is, of course, a notoriously dodgy concept. Does it exist? What it is, then? Is it the same thing as wrong? Are people evil, or is it only
actions that are? Or not even actions, but consequences? Even people who appeal to Biblical authority on these questions don't agree with each other
very often.

'Money' seems like a simpler idea until you begin to look more closely. The closer you look, the more elusive it becomes: what, really, is the
essence of money? A medium of exchange? A store of value? A symbol of social rank? It is all these and many more. Is it not possible to love money in
some aspects and hate it in others?

We will find, if we look hard enough, that money is not really the root of anything: it is a fruit, or a flower, on the tree of human desire. And as
someone very correctly pointed out a few posts ago, human beings have many desires. The love of money is, perhaps, the root of the mortal sin of
avarice - but is it, for example, the root of sloth? Sloth is evil too - at least according to Christian doctine - but how could love of money be the
root of sloth?

Obviously, it cannot; but money itself can certainly be the root of sloth, the root of pride and the enabler of lust and gluttony. Both money and the
love of it can be the root of anger. So, taken all in all, I think the common saw 'money is the root of all evil' is at least as true as the
Biblical maxim concerning it. The OP's proposition is still in play, and well worth discussing.

If the love of money is the root of evil, then so is money. And a lot of other things, too. Radical stuff, money.

This content community relies on user-generated content from our member contributors. The opinions of our members are not those of site ownership who maintains strict editorial agnosticism and simply provides a collaborative venue for free expression.